Coping with Devalued Expertise: Age and Contested Legitimacy Among Cultural Workers

• In Event: Culture and Economic Life

Abstract

Sociologists have long noted that age is a fundamental career contingency defining which lines of action are available or unavailable to workers. Age stereotypes shape valuations of workers’ expertise and therefore impact individuals’ membership in occupational communities. However, despite a growing literature on social inequalities in careers, the role of age is still relatively misunderstood. Prior research suggests that older workers must cope with interactional and identity challenges to their expertise, but little research captures agentic efforts of older workers to adapt to these conditions. Such an oversight is especially concerning given how shifting work contexts, such as globalization, increased competition, and new technological advancements are making expertise increasingly temporary across fields. Using a fast-changing, youth-driven field as a case study—the record industry—this paper focuses on the strategies older workers use to combat the perceived depreciation of their expertise. Studies on cultural production rely primarily on two explanations for the difficulties of career persistence in creative fields: “aesthetic contestation” theories which highlight intergenerational tensions in the process of legitimation, and “churning” theories which emphasize the exploitation of the labor force. Drawing on fieldwork and interview data with record industry personnel, this paper connects and extends these theories by showing how older workers attempt to fend off age bias and retain cultural membership (and their jobs) in this labor market. I find that, over time, workers who remain in the record industry respond to the contestation of their expertise by adopting two potential strategies: (1) stressing their human capital and downplaying their aesthetic knowledge; or (2) continually attempting to remain culturally attuned. Aging workers therefore respond to the devaluation of their expertise by redefining or replenishing expertise. I conclude with implications for future research.

Author

• Alexandre Frenette, Vanderbilt University